Melting brass and bronze at home: zinc fumes, higher heat, and why the crucible matters

Brass melts around 1700°F (hotter than aluminum's 1220°F), which charcoal with forced air can do but propane needs a good burner for. The problem is zinc: it boils off as white smoke (zinc oxide) that gives you metal fume fever. Melt outdoors, upwind, with a respirator, and a cover of broken glass or borax on the melt helps.

Bronze (copper-tin) is friendlier: no zinc flare, nicer casting, stronger. Scrap plumbing fittings are brass; old bearings and bells are bronze. Use a clay-graphite crucible rated for the temperature; a steel crucible dissolves into the melt at these heats and contaminates it.